Nepal Stock Exchange (NEPSE) last week shed 11.15 points to close at 1,161.63 points, as investors became dismayed with the ongoing glitches in the automated online trading software and the government’s plan to make Permanent Account Number mandatory for all investors.

With the market index shrinking, the average daily turnover also plunged to Rs267.63 million from Rs324.26 million in the previous week. The secondary market that opened at 1,172.78 points on Sunday slid 10.69 points to close at 1,162.09 points. On Monday, the market recovered and gained 2.8 points before losing 3.9 points and 0.4 points on Tuesday and Wednesday respectively. The week ended with a marginal gain of 1.04 points on Thursday.

In overall trading, the market declined by 0.95 percent over the review period.

Stockbrokers said the ongoing glitches in the automated online trading system and the questionable policies of the government led to investors staying away from the secondary market.

“Although the sector’s regulators last week started enforcing a number of minor policies such as the merging of merchant bankers and barring brokers from taking advance payment from investors, the majority of large investors are waiting for the government to actually introduce market conducive policies,” said a stockbroker under condition of anonymity.

The sensitive index that measures the performance of Group ‘A’ companies also declined 1.85 points to close at 246.8 points with a fall in the sub-indices of majority of the listed companies. With a slump in the market, Rs13.59 billion was wiped from the market, as the market capitalisation fell to Rs1,417.21 billion from Rs1,430.80 billion.

Except for microfinance and trading, the remaining nine groups landed in the red. Non-life insurance lost the largest of 101.14 points and closed at 5,582.02 points.

The sub-indices of life-insurance, manufacturing and hydropower posted double digit loss of 83.34 points, 75.63 points and 37.02 points respectively. The remaining losers during the review period were hotels (8.19 points), commercial banks (7.89 points), development banks (6.29 points), finance companies (5.47 points and ‘others’ (1.52 points).

Of the gainers, the sub-indices of microfinance and trading inched up by 4.6 points and 1.31 points respectively during the review period. Regarding individual companies, Upper Tamakoshi posted shares transaction worth Rs103.23 million, the largest of all. It was followed by Citizen Investment Trust, Nepal Bank Limited, NIC Asia Bank and promoters’ shares of Prabhu Bank Limited.

Last week, stocks worth Rs1.33 billion were transacted, which was 17.9 percent less than the transaction amount in the previous week. The total number of traded shares also declined to 4,572,860 units from 5,359,753 units.

Over the review period, NEPSE listed a total of 4,507,552.62 units bonus shares of Citizen Investment Trust, Mahalaxmi Bikas Bank and Pokhara Finance.

Right Shares/Bonus Shares

Company                          Type                  Units

Citizen Investment Trust    Bonus Shares    408,225

Mahalaxmi Bikas Bank       Bonus Shares    2,107,037.96

Pokhara Finance                 Bonus Shares    1,992,289.66